Universal (Mac/PC) Video Format?

[admin]

Originally Posted by gdom

.avi or .mov

Does .avi come in compressed varieties?

What does YouTube use? Can't everyone view those?

-Ron

[peterpink]

Originally Posted by admin

Does .avi come in compressed varieties?

What does YouTube use? Can't everyone view those?

-Ron

Mac and PC can view YouTube. I use .mpg for videos in Powerpoint presentations so they work on both Mac and PC.

[pi314]

Ron
You might consider making your videos available in .3gp format. That specific format can be played on many devices (cell phones included).

[trying]

Originally Posted by admin

Hey watch it! That site uses the best 1995 technology money can buy. It's built with FrontPage.

-Ron

Ah yes 1995 a vintage year for technology indeed,

[gdom]

Originally Posted by admin

It's built with FrontPage.

-Ron

lol

[gdom]

Originally Posted by admin

Does .avi come in compressed varieties?

What does YouTube use? Can't everyone view those?

-Ron

YouTube uses Flash (.flv). You'll need adobe flash to encode something like that.

[Tally]

Originally Posted by admin

Does .avi come in compressed varieties?

What does YouTube use? Can't everyone view those?

-Ron

Most mobile devices can access YouTube videos, including the iPad and WM devices.

[trying]

Ron send me a private message I will help you convert your video.

[MelancholyLogic]

Originally Posted by admin

What's the single best video file format that both Mac and Windows guys will be able to view?

-Ron

Ron,

H.264 and WMV are both proprietary file formats. (There are others as well). The problem with proprietary video codecs is that they are controlled by a company or a consortium which can limit the platforms on which a video can be viewed. In other words, others may not be able to write software that can use a proprietary file format because the format is either not openly documented or because of a risk of patent lawsuits. The same goes for Adobe Flash. The Flash plug-in is a proprietary format that is controlled by Adobe and is not supported on every platform.

All content on the web should be provided in an open, free (libre) format as to provide a level playing field for all users accessing the web. Most things such as text, and images (PNG, GIF, JPEG) are open formats that are able to be freely-implemented. This is why web browsers are able to support this stuff out-of-the-box without requiring extra plugins. For this reason, you should consider using an open, non-patent-encumbered format for video. One example of an open, non-patent-encumbered video format is WebM. Some browsers like Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome and Opera either already support it or are in the process of adding support for it.

As for playback, there has been a recent push to make HTML (the language in which most websites are written) support the embedding and playback of video without the need of plugins--the same as text and pictures. The next version of the HTML specification (HTML 5) includes a so-called "video tag" that allows websites to embed video.

So in summary, you should offer the video in an open format like WebM. If you want to make it playable through the browser, use the HTML 5 video tag.

Related Links:
WebM Project
Video For Everybody